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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

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rshow55 - 11:38am Apr 2, 2003 EST (# 10962 of 10967)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

They have to clean up a lot of little messes - and also some big ones.

We have to clean up fewer messes, overall, though we have plenty of messes. Including some very big ones.

The things that everybody involved really ought to want to do are the things that most need to be done - and they don't look that hard to me.

But the incidence of lying has to come down. Or, failing that, there have to be better means of imposing checking when it matters enough.

Missile defense is a "small example" - complicated enough to work out and demonstrate all the technical tools that checking would take.

Some honesty wouldn't hurt - so less checking would be necessary.

rshow55 - 11:44am Apr 2, 2003 EST (# 10963 of 10967)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

Some very able people in the Arab world know they have problems - and are showing some clarity and courage as they address them. I got this off of http://www.aljazeerah.info/

Arab world needs to start doing something useful, the Daily Star, 4/1/03 http://www.aljazeerah.info/1%20op%20eds/Arab%20world%20needs%20to%20start%20doing%20something%20useful,%20the%20Daily%20Star%20aljazeerah.info.htm

"Iraq is thus far the only country being invaded by the United States and Britain, but clearly the entire Arab world is under siege. Everything about Arab governance and Arab culture, especially as regards the influence of Islam, is being subjected to intense scrutiny by what can only be perceived as hostile foreign powers. Most of those Arab countries that had traditionally been first to deplore outside interference have either been intimidated into silence or bought into outright support. Arab economies are teetering on the brink of disaster, and Arab families are therefore faced with the very real prospect of not being able to feed their children or care for their elderly.

"The official Arab reaction to all of this has been predictably muted. After all, Arab governments bear a large measure of the responsibility for the dual crises under way in Iraq and Palestine, so there is no reason for them to attract additional attention to their innumerable errors. The popular reaction, still faced with the absence of legal, regularized venues for legitimate opposition, has been to hit the streets in much the same manner as was witnessed in the early part of the 20th century. Instead of pathetically sitting on its collective hands or pointlessly waving them in the air, the Arab world desperately needs to be more creative, to seek out useful alternatives to the (obviously) failed ways of the past and present.

- - -

"There are certainly no guarantees that such projects will succeed. In fact, they may have no chance at all of getting beyond the tired rhetoric to which Arabs have become so accustomed. Be that as it may, anything would be better than to watch quietly while a civilization implodes because of both external pressure and internal passivity.

Arab civilization doesn't have to "implode" - and not all that much would have to be changed for it to do beautifully. But some things would have to be faced. Some muddles are too expensive to tolerate - as the editorial above makes clear.

dccougar - 06:56pm Apr 2, 2003 EST (# 10964 of 10967)
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion but not his own facts.

almarst2003 - 09:21pm Apr 1, 2003 EST - The proof: marketplace deaths were caused by a US missile "An American missile, identified from the remains of its serial number, was pinpointed yesterday as the cause of the explosion at a Baghdad market on Friday night that killed at least 62 Iraqis.... The codes on the foot-long shrapnel shard [was] seen by the Independent (UK) correspondent Robert Fisk at the scene of the bombing in the Shu'ale district...."

So you think that offers uncontrovertible proof, do you, Alarmist? Tell me then: Exactly how long after the explosion was this foot-long piece of shrapnel found? Several days? You don't know? OK, tell me this, then: Do you think it is conceivable that one of those honest, honorable, and upstanding Iraqi soldiers might have placed that piece of shrapnel at the site of the market explosion after it had been picked up from some other location, say, one of the presidential palaces? Do you think that's a possibility? Do you think that's likely? Do you think you ought to climb back under your rock, you slimy anti-American bastard?

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense